And horses continued to go down, whilst others backed, despite the shrieking commands of their riders. More spears raked riders from their saddles, crowds closing about individuals.
All at once, the Awl were seeking to withdraw, and the Edur warriors began pushing, the square’s flanks advancing in an effort to enclose the attackers.
Someone was screaming at Brohl Handar. Someone at his side, and he turned to see one of his runners.
Who was pointing westward with frantic gestures.
Bluerose cavalry, forming up.
Brohl Handar stared at the distant ranks, the sun-lashed lance-heads held high, the horses’ heads lifting and tossing, then he shook himself. ‘Sound close ranks! The square does not pursue! Close ranks and let the enemy withdraw!’
Moments later, horns blared.
The Awl did not understand. Panic was already among them, and the sudden recoiling of those now advancing Edur struck them as an opportunity. Eager to disengage, the horse-warriors sprang away from all contact-twenty paces-archers twisting in their saddles to loose arrows-forty, fifty paces, and a copper-faced officer among them yelling at his troops to draw up, to reform for another charge-and there was thunder in the west, and that warrior turned in his saddle, and saw, descending upon his milling ranks, his own death.
His death, and that of his warriors.
Brohl Handar watched as the commander frantically tried to wheel his troops, to set them, to push the weary, bloodied beasts and their equally weary riders into a j meeting charge-but it was too late. Voices cried out in fear as warriors saw what was descending upon them. The confusion redoubled, and then riders were breaking, fleeing-
All at once, the Bluerose lancers swept into them.
Brohl Handar looked down upon his Arapay-Sister Shadow, but we have been wounded. ‘Sound the slow advance!’ he commanded, stepping forward and drawing his sword. ‘We will finish what the Bluerose have begun.’ I want those bastards. Every damned one of them. Screaming in pain, dying by our blades!
Something dark and savage swirled awake within him. Oh, there would be pleasure in killing. Here. Now. Such pleasure.
As the Bluerose charge rolled through the Awl cavalry, a broad-bladed lance caught Natarkas-still shrieking his commands to wheel-in the side of the head. The point punched through low on his left temple, beneath the rim of the bronze-banded helm. It shattered that plate of the skull, along with his cheekbone and the orbit of the eye. Then drove still deeper, through brain and nasal cavity.
Blackness bloomed in his mind.
Beneath him-as he toppled, twisted round when the lance dragged free-his horse staggered before the impact of the attacker’s own mount; then, as the weight of Natarkas’s body rolled away, the beast bolted, seeking a place away from this carnage, this terror.
All at once, open plain ahead and two other riderless horses racing away, heads high in sudden freedom.
Natarkas’s horse set off after them.
The chaos in its heart dwindled, faded, fluttered away with every exultant breath the beast drew into its aching lungs.
Free!
Never! Free!
Never again!
On the seabed, the heavy infantry wedges advanced beneath the now constant hail of descending arrows. Skittering on raised shields, glancing from visored helms, stabbing down through gaps in armour and chance ricochets. Soldiers cried out, stumbled, recovered or sought to fall-but these latter were suddenly grasped by hands on either side and bodies closed in, keeping them upright, feet now dragging as life poured its crimson gift to the churned mud below. Those hands then began pushing the dead and the dying forward, through the ranks. Hands reaching back, grasping, tugging and pulling, then pushing into yet more waiting hands.
Through all of this, the chant continued, the wait beat marked each settling step.
Twelve paces from the Awl on their islands of dry, able now to see into faces, to see the blazing eyes filled with fear or rage.
This slow advance could not but unnerve the waiting Awl. Human spear-heads, edging ever closer. Massive iron fangs, inexorably looming, step, wait, step, wait, step.
And now, eight paces away, arrow-riddled corpses were being flung forward from the front ranks, the bodies sprawling into the mud. Shields followed here and there. Boots settled atop these things, pushing them into the mud.
Bodies and shields, appearing in a seemingly unending stream.
Building, there in the last six strides, a floor of flesh, leather, wood and armour.
Javelins sleeted into those wedges, driving soldiers back and down, only to have their bodies thrust forward with chilling disregard. The wounded bled out. The wounded drowned screaming in the mud. And each wedge seemed to lift itself up and out of the mud, although the cadence did not change.